Bicarbonate of soda, or baking soda, is an alkali which is used to raise soda breads and full-…

1 tsp ground cinnamon

½ tsp grated nutmeg (freshly grated will give you the best flavour)

For the frosting

175g icing sugar

1½-2 tbsp orange juice

Method

Preheat the oven to 180C/Gas 4/fan 160C. Oil and line the base and sides of an 18cm square cake tin with baking parchment. The easiest way to do this is to cut two long strips the width of the tin and put each strip crossways, covering the base and sides of the tin, with a double layer in the base.

Tip the sugar into a large mixing bowl, pour in the oil and add the eggs. Lightly mix with a wooden spoon. Stir in the grated carrots, raisins and orange rind.

Mix the flour, bicarbonate of soda and spices, then sift into the bowl. Lightly mix all the ingredients – when everything is evenly amalgamated stop mixing. The mixture will be fairly soft and almost runny.

Pour the mixture into the prepared tin and bake for 40- 45 minutes, until it feels firm and springy when you press it in the centre. Cool in the tin for 5 minutes, then turn it out, peel off the paper and cool on a wire rack. (You can freeze the cake at this point.)

Beat together the frosting ingredients in a small bowl until smooth – you want the icing about as runny as single cream. Set the cake on a serving plate and boldly drizzle the icing back and forth in diagonal lines over the top, letting it drip down the sides.

I made this using two 8" lined cake tins and sandwiched it together with a thin layer of butter cream with a little freshly squeezed orange juice instead of milk and drizzled the orange icing on top to spill over the sides...to make a birthday cake for my grown up daughter who has a passion for carrot cake. Worked perfectly. Excellent recipe.

Gorgeous cake - I followed the suggestions below and used just 150ml sunflower oil. I also used sultanas rather than raisins as I prefer their milder taste and extra plumpness. Made the traditional cream cheese frosting - cancelling out the calorie reduction of using less oil! But in my opinion if you're going to make carrot cake it's got to have that scrummy topping...

Maybe I'm just not a carrot cake person- thought it was okay. Everyone else on the other hand couldn't stop raving about how good and addictive it was and that it was one of the best carrot cakes they've had!

Brilliant recipe. Easy, tasty, light and far too easy to eat. I always get great results with this and receive many compliments. If you have the time and are feeling adventurous, cream cheese icing works well with this cake too.

Delicious. I also upped the carrots, used less oil. Made a few substitutions due to what I had in the cupboard. Wholemeal self raising rather than white, vegetable oil rather than sunflower, chopped up prunes rather than raisins and bunged some chopped walnuts and pecan nuts in too to use up two ends of packets. Added some mixed spice. Used tbs of orange flower water as didn't have an orange. Really nice cake even so. Thanks!

Although I'm practically an ancestor, I've never ever made a cake before! However, this looked easy enough for me to risk trying. I was truly delighted with the result, though I hate the twee-ness of the name. It was indeed extremely easy. Like a number of others, however, I felt that it was a touch oily, so I shall definitely be trying it again with the suggested changes - oil to 150ml and carrot to 175 g. Living in a walnut producing area, I can't resist the idea of adding 50 g next time.

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